


So Stay If You Want

by rosedolores



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Basically Age of Ultron with a little spin, Explicit Sexual Content, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, they cant stay away from each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-04
Updated: 2019-01-04
Packaged: 2019-10-04 11:30:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,744
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17303816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosedolores/pseuds/rosedolores
Summary: “You didn’t answer me,” Loki says “am I really gone?”Thor closes his eyes. It’s easier if he doesn’t see Loki. “You are.”The Avengers are trying to stop Ultron, and Thor dreams of the dead.





	So Stay If You Want

**Author's Note:**

> “Come on,” says Loki, standing above him on the stairs. Three steps and Thor would be on the same level. “I’m curious.”
> 
> Thor looks up at his brother, standing tall and regal and unapproachable between the dirty walls of the staircase. His always out-of-place brother, out-of-reach, outstanding. Three steps, and–

Thor feels the terrible grief seconds before he hears Wanda’s scream, Mjolnir shaking in his hands, begging to let her fly away, because she recognizes this heartache, she remembers it. It hits him in the chest, his heart thudding too hard, then stopping for what seems like a quiet eternity, and he doesn’t move.

What if the girl’s pain will tear the whole world apart, before Ultron would have the chance? Whole buildings trembling in the aftershock of her cry, the air filled with ash and burning light, the windows blowing out in a silent vacuum. Thor squeezes his eyes shut, and tastes blood in his mouth. The church rings its shattered bells.

 

-                                                                         

 

When they step onto the carrier, and Wanda sees Pietro, Thor puts his hand on her shoulder.

“You will be okay,” he says. A gentle lie.

Wanda doesn’t look up at him, but nods, barely. She knows he is lying. The only reason she lets it pass with understanding is because she felt the empty black space in Thor’s soul, back then, when they first met. She doesn’t know about Loki, but feels his absence from Thor.

Her hands don’t shake as she cradles her twin’s head in her lap, gently combing through his hair with her fingertips. She leaves them bloodied from her torn nails.

 

-

 

“We have a speedy legs kid in our company, lady and gents, and I hate him.” Barton’s voice crackles with false cheer in his comm.

Thor doesn’t bother telling Barton that they’ve already seen him, and throws Mjolnir through one of Ultron’s sentries, then grabs the one that is fool enough to think that without his hammer he can’t fight, and flips it into the edge of Rogers’ shield. It’s a clean cut.

“Are you saying he is faster than your arrows?” mock-gasps Romanov.

“Yeah, yeah, keep on kicking Nat, why don’t you,” replies Barton.

“Focus please,” comes the stern voice from Rogers.

Thor smiles a little as he tries to shake the pain out of his hand where the sentry’s splintered armour nicked him. It’s bleeding like all hell, but not deep. Sometimes his teammates remind him of Sif and the Warriors Three. The best of the best both worlds had to offer. He is lucky he had found them, to be accepted as a teammate, but there is a kind of disquiet that grows inside him, asking him questions he doesn’t want to think about.

He swallows and stops himself from remembering.

Stark fights Ultron and stays silent.

A little later Thor makes his rounds on the second floor of the battered warehouse, the catwalk clinking with his every step. He doesn’t really care about how loud he is, let them come at him. There is barely anyone left.

Still, he can’t shake off the feeling that they are missing something. Mjolnir murmurs with restless energy and he rolls his shoulders as he takes the corner.

The girl. He takes a step back involuntarily, but doesn’t swing Mjolnir, because he won’t hurt a girl who barely comes up to his chest, with too big clothes on a too thin body.

Thor stares into her eyes, and they look so tired, so hopeless in the flickering yellow light of the dirty neon lamps that he almost laughs. It feels like looking into a mirror.

 He opens his mouth to ask her to leave, but she lifts her hands, her fingers glowing with crimson light and the space around them hums so loud Thor takes another step back, trying to get away from it.

His vision blurs around the edges, and he knows he is still looking at the girl, he knows he sees her, but doesn’t. She is standing right before him he knows this, but his eyes don’t focus on her, because she is not there. His mind reels, and Mjolnir screams.

He closes his eyes for a moment, sees red all over, opens them and everything is back to normal.

Rogers’ voice comes through the comm, and it really doesn’t help the growing headache that has been irritating Thor for the past twenty minutes.

“Thor, what is your status.”

“I met the girl, she has tried to,” he pauses for a second so he can find the right term for it, but he has no idea what to look for, “hypnotize me.”

Thor squeezes his bloodied hand, and the white-hot pain is welcomed.

“Oh no, no, not again,” mutters Barton.

“Where is she?” asks Rogers briskly.

“Not here.” Thor can’t say it simpler. He doesn’t get an answer.

 

-

 

Thor stares into Heimdall’s eyes, and they are blind to the world, Heimdall can’t see, he doesn’t _see_.

There are too many people around Thor, the air is heavy with the sweat of the bodies, it’s sharp and unpleasant. There are women dancing in a languid delirium, half naked, drunk, men laughing too loud, pushing and tossing their friends. One of them bumps into Thor, his wine spilling on his arm, and Thor flinches, he wants to step away, to run away, but Heimdall doesn’t let go of him, forces his face back to him. The wine like acid burns through his skin.

“Heimdall,” Thor says, feeling lost. This isn’t Asgard. This is Asgard.

“Welcome back, Thor,” says Heimdall, but it’s his father voice Thor hears. “Welcome home.”

“What–” starts to ask, tries to look around, but Heimdall’s fingers dig deep into his cheek.

“You are dead Thor, but you are alive. A walking corpse,” this time Heimdall’s laugh is his, coming from every corner of the place, deep and drowning. “Look where you led us. Where we followed you.”

Thor pries Heimdall’s fingers away from him, not caring if he breaks them. This is not real. Mustn’t be real.

“I’m not dead,” he says. It doesn’t feel like the truth. Heimdall just laughs at him, wild and mad, the greys of his eyes are swarming like a thick fog. Heimdall can’t see through them, he can’t.

“Then what are you, first son of Odin?”

Thor shakes his head. “I’m his only son.”

The laughter and shouting coming from around them is deafening, Thor ears are ringing, and his skin crawls, like everyone is grabbing and yanking at him. Nobody touched him since the man who spilled his wine on him.

“Yes, his only dead son,” shouts Heimdall, and Thor reels back. “What about the other one?”

“There isn’t,” Thor starts, and now he is shouting too, not because of anger, but the rumbling of the dark sky above them, but this is not his storm, he didn’t call upon it, this is not his. “There isn’t anyone. There never was. Just me, and Father.”

Heimdall grins, and pushes Thor off a cliff.

As Thor falls the last he sees is the white light of the thunderstorm, bright and cruel, and an unfamiliar sceptre with one of the Infinity Stones in it. He keeps his eyes open until the impact kills him.

When he comes to in the warehouse, he drops to his knees, rubs his flaming forehead to the cool metal of the platform, and whispers Loki’s name again and again, until his tongue feels numb.

 

-

 

Back at the Avengers headquarters, Thor doesn’t come down from his floor for four days. He doesn’t dream. He doesn’t sleep.

 

-

 

The twins got their own rooms at the headquarters, but not a whole floor. _You are not members_ says Stark for the hundredth time, when the boy, Pietro, asks _but why_ for the hundredth time.

The girl is more quiet, not so quick to smile, but Thor knows she is kind. Smart too. She reads them like an open book, even those whose mind she didn’t reach during the fight in the warehouse.

Thor likes her bravery the best. The first night with the team, while they were sitting around on the low couches, she grabbed her twin, sat him down beside Barton – he grumbled like an old cat, and the boy rolled his eyes at him – stood in the center, took a deep breath and stared down everyone.

“I’m sorry.” she said. Plain and simple. Powerful. True. “I know I caused a lot of pain for many of you, and I apologize for that.”

She’d played with her fingers, suddenly not so brave, and when she said, “I can only hope you will never have to suffer through these pains ever again in your lives,” Thor remembers he never saw Romanov smile like that before.

Then Barton said, oddly proud, “Hey, I’m sorry I zapped you in the head.”

Romanov got up and smacked his head.

 

-

 

A week and they lost all leads on Ultron. They sit all huddled up in the tower, wanting to stay together in case of emergency, but they were not built for sharing space.

They stay on their own floors, sometimes coming together for a night at the main floor. Those hours are enough for them.  

Thor still hasn’t slept. He thinks of Jane at her apartment. _Their apartment_ she always corrects him. Through the days sometimes he wonders if she thinks of him. He also thinks it would be great if they defeated Ultron right now, so he could finally go back to her and leave the black and grey durasteel panels of the tower.

But one night, when in fear he will fall asleep Thor goes to the gym to hit the punching bag, he thinks he would just trade one cage for another.

He gets so angry at everything that Mjolnir comes to his hand without him even thinking about it, blasting her way through the walls. He doesn’t want to be here, he doesn’t want to be with Jane.

_Then where?_

 So he doesn’t think about Jane for a while.

Later Stark lectures him about costs – they both know it’s not a problem for him – but doesn’t ask.

 

-

 

“What are they doing?” asks Rogers with desperation when he steps down the stairs leading into the main floor. Thor smiles into his coffee. His fourth one in the last two hours.

“Well, idiot one,” starts Stark from behind the black marble of the kitchen island, looking outside the helicopter landing area for a moment, then back to making his green liquid disaster, “is shooting arrows at idiot two, and idiot two tries to catch them.”

Thor has been sitting on the couch between Romanov and Wanda for a while now, all three of them facing the landing area outside, the big glass panel separating them from a very excited Barton and Pietro.

Barton shoots arrows like a madman, running and jumping and twisting in the air, but none of them falls over the landing area, down to the street, or cuts through the window.

Romanov smiles lazy every time Pietro catches the arrow aimed at the glass. Should it go through, it would fly into her heart.

“Right,” says Rogers, still watching them, one hand smoothing over his mouth, his cheeks. “Right,” says again. Looks down at Wanda, “Okay,” he sighs.

Wanda has a Rubik’s cube in front of her, out of her lap in the air, her fingers moving gently, red light humming and shimmering around them, the cube turning slowly with its squares clicking into place. She isn’t even looking at it, her eyes are trying to follow her brother.

The sound of her telekinesis is splitting through Thor’s head like a knife, sharp against his temples, but he clenches his teeth and stays put.

“Anyway, Thor, Tony come with me please, I want to go over some things.” Rogers is already halfway through the sliding panels, and Stark cheers with his vile drink.

Thor nods and moves to put down his cup on the coffee table, but the world tilts around its axis, a slight tremor running through his hand, and it makes him clatter the cup against the glass surface. Just for a moment. Romanov is still looking out at Barton and Pietro, but Wanda is staring right at him.

As he stands, outside Barton readies his arrow, the light reflecting on it like a lion’s eyes in the dark, blinding Thor, then it flies, and Pietro, for the first time, fails to catch.

It bumps against the window with a sharp thud, but doesn’t pierce it. Thor sees it this way; the window shatters, pieces of glass like raindrops playing on his skin, an arrow, through his head. No prisoners.

 

-

 

Thor gasps with a shudder on the top of his bed. He didn’t even manage to get himself under the blanket, his T-shirt clings to him with stifling sweat, the grey of it feels like a dead second skin, and Thor sits up to wrench it off himself, grimacing when the sudden movement pulls on his hair. With a trembling hand he massages his chest wishing he could tear out his too fast beating heart so this feeling could finally stop already.

He steels himself before looking at the red neon of the clock on the bedside table, the only source of light in the darkness. It feels like staring into the eyes of a beast.

2:47 AM.

Eighteen minutes then, since he closed his eyes. His mind didn’t let him have more. All the better.

He gets out of bed without much preamble, his need to get the furthest away from it as fast as possible growing with each second. The soft – even this feels irritating on his skin – sleeping pants slung too low on his hips, one end catches under his feet and he slips on it, bumping his calf into the edge of the bed, but the pain comes a little too slow, a little too late, and it registers as something not good but he really doesn’t care. Thor pulls them higher and goes on.

He feels his way into the bathroom, the dimmed light of the built in lightpanels pouring in from the hallway is just enough for him to successfully drench his face with lukewarm water from the tap. He didn’t have the patience to wait for the water to get cold enough. Thor rubs the water from his eyes and goes on.

He claws down on a worn-down hoodie in the laundry basket, faded black like his past self, puts it on, pulls the hood over his head – like this could hide him – and heads down to the communal kitchen. Thor hopes with false, stupid optimism that the whispers will stay in his bedroom behind him, and goes on.

“You shouldn’t drink coffee at this hour, you look horrible.” The light tilting of Wanda’s voice is not necessarily kind but it is concerned.

Thor looks at her from across the kitchen island and takes a long sip, not telling her that half of it is whiskey.

But still, his mother didn’t raise him an animal.

“Thank you. I’m just starting my day though.” His smile must look as put on as it feels.

“You mean continuing.” Wanda comes to stop at the other end, putting her hands on the black marble.  

“I had a nap this afternoon, so–” Thor shrugs.

“You didn’t,” says Wanda with a raised eyebrow.

Thor squints at her, and drowns the rest of his coffee fast, because for a moment he fears Wanda will take it from him.

“It’s nothing,” He lies through his teeth. “I’m okay.”

Wanda starts coming around the island and Thor hates himself so much, because he steps into the direction of the other end of it. Keeping his distance.

“You have to sleep.” Wanda is on his half now, but doesn’t move towards him, probably because she saw him move. Possibly.

How does Thor explain that this girl sent him into the worst of all worlds, where he didn’t know Loki. The deep nothingness he felt then. How does he explain that he fears to sleep because what if waking up means waking up without the memory of his brother. How does he describe the blind madness of Heimdall. How does he ask if he fears the answer?

“I mean,” continues Wanda “you have to sleep, as in, you have to let yourself have those dreams.”

“Are you doing this to me?” asks Thor, in his tightening grip his mug cracks ominously.

Wanda shakes her head. “I think it might be some kind of lingering effect of when I… when we met at the warehouse.”

When she broke all of them goes unsaid.

“The others? Do they dream?”

“No.”

Thor sighs, because the other option would be calling Mjolnir to him, and flying away from all this.

On his way out the door Wanda says after him, surprisingly hard, “I’m sorry you are incomplete.”

Thor wonders if he really should just go to sleep and hope he wakes up forgetting.

 

-

 

The whispers are starting to sound like Loki’s voice, lifetimes ago, when he murmured daring words coated in sugar and lavender, when he would send Thor from one trouble into the other. But who was really at fault, Loki for creating madness, or Thor for laying ground for it?

Thor sits heavy in the plush armchair that he dragged in front of his window, letting the night lights of the city smudge into fluorescent whirls of yellow and pink and blue before his tired eyes, and listens. He never knew this kind of melodious sorrow before.

Loki hums his name, says _Thor_ , and his sharp canines glint like broken pearls as he grins. Thor doesn’t answer, because there is no one to answer to anymore.

 

-

 

There is a slap on his face, scrambling around and finally closing over his mouth. Thor takes a sharp breath through his nose, his sleep muddled mind still trying to wake up, but he doesn’t fight the weight on him. His body remembers it as something familiar from a childhood spent roughhousing. That doesn’t stop him from trying to glower at Loki, looming over him like a madman in the dark, his hair an unrestrained wilderness around him, black on black; it’s like he came from night itself and in a few hours he will go back into it. There is a smudge of dirt on his face. A nocturnal animal.

“I am the most amazing being in all the realms, and fate found you worthy enough to call me brother,” Loki whispers in sharp-fast words, his glee showing in the pressing of his hand. Thor shakes it off his face.

“Why is your hand so damned cold,” Thor hisses, but realizes that maybe this is not the most pressing matter right in the middle of the night, with Loki straddling him with barely contained excitement.

“What did you do?” he asks, his mind going zero to sixty immediately, and tries to sit up, but Loki doesn’t let him, pushes him back down with a hand on the center of his bare chest. Thor makes a noise again, and grips his blanket with both hands.

“It’s not that cold, stop whining,” Loki snaps at him.

Thor glares up at him. “What did you do?” he asks again.

Loki bends down a little, putting his weight on his hand, and smiles, all honeylike. Thor tries to take a deep breath and the world braces itself.

“Something really fun,” Loki murmurs with delight.

“Okay,” says Thor, like it doesn’t scare him.

“Something really smart,” a lock of Loki’s hair slides down on one side, fluttering against the side of his pale, pale face, and Loki shakes his head a little, but it doesn’t help much. Thor thinks about smoothing it back behind his ear for him, but thinks better of it.

“Loki,” he warns.

Loki huffs and looks out the window for a moment, then back at Thor.

“You know, one thing I have always, _always_ hated was, that Heimdall could see everything. It antagonized me to no end.”

“Yes, you mention this at least a hundred times a day,” Thor says.

Loki’s eyes glint. “Shut up. Anyway, once I got so angry I told him that I don’t envy him, because he has to watch us grow up and one day he will have to watch us die. He didn’t laugh.”

“It’s not funny,” Thor jostles Loki a bit.

“Not to _you,_ ” Loki pushes back on his chest. He sighs, “The way he could monitor my every step. It was always so terribly inconvenient. I could never go where I really wanted to.”

Thor swallows hard around his next word.

“Was.”

Loki laughs, “Go on, guess. I want to hear it from you.” An offering, then.

Thor doesn’t want to play Loki’s game, but he doesn’t have much choice. Never really had.

“You managed to elude Heimdall’s gaze.” He always knew Loki would eventually accomplish this, but not this early. He thought he would have more time to prepare himself, to think of something.

“That was just a small obstacle dealt with. I did something way better, Thor. Think big.” Loki leans closer to him, his eyes pinning Thor to the bed. Thor takes him in, his chaotic hair, the smudge of dirt, and he feels his heart stutter against his ribcage, in fear, in gritty _excitement_. Because Loki, Loki–

“You found it. The way to travel without the Bifrost,” he says in a rush, and his hands fly to Loki’s waist, gripping him hard, and pushes himself against Loki’s hand, sitting up. He wants to see Loki’s face from closer when he says;

“I did it, Thor.” Loki’s nails digging into his skin.

There is no way to keep Loki close and safe anymore. There is nothing Thor can do.

“Why?” he asks. Not how.

Loki shrugs.

“I was always curious if I could do it.” Loki’s voice is dripping with satisfaction, “Turns out I could, brother.”

Thor shakes his head. “No. I won’t allow it.”

Loki’s eyes widen with angry bewilderment. “Excuse me?”

“You are not to travel on any other path than Bifrost. You are not to hide from Heimdall.” Thor hears their father in his words.

Loki tries to lean further away from him, but Thor holds him all the more tighter. Like this way he could prevent Loki from vanishing. This is the one fear of Thor’s, the one he had from childhood, that ages with him stubborn, and soars each time Loki disappears without a word for more than a single _day_. What will happen, now that there are no limits?

When Loki spits, “I will do what I want, Thor, regardless of your _wishes._ ” Thor wonders if there were even limits to begin with.

“I will stop you.”

The elbow on his jaw stuns him enough to loosen his grasp on Loki’s waist, his hand slipping on his shirt, and then Loki’s forearm against his throat pushes him back down on the bed, lightning fast. His breath catches, his skin running hot and cold at the same time.

Loki looks at him, eyes shining from unshed tears, and Thor wants to scream that this is for the best, he is doing this for _Loki_. He is proud, and immensely impressed with his little brother. But he loves him so much he feels _fear_ , and he is so scared at the rawness of it.

“Will you, brother,” Loki shakes against him, and his knife digs deep into the skin of Thor’s chest, just above his heart. The silver of it glints like the moon.

Loki smiles cruel, “Then tell me when to stop,” and starts pressing in his knife.

It hurts, but Loki’s skin burning hot against him is more painful.

 

-

 

Thor jerks out of his armchair, stumbles into the bathroom, his sweating hand slipping around the light switch before finally flipping it on, and struggles to pull down the neck of his shirt so he could see his chest in the mirror.

A minute ago his fingers absentmindedly danced across his chest where the scar should be, he wanted to feel the ragged edges, but he couldn’t find it, he didn’t feel–

Thor pulls harder at his shirt collar, the fabric ripping, his nails raking down on his skin, leaving red-hot marks, and Thor revels in it, because pain means he is awake. That this is his doing, not Loki’s.

Thor closes his eyes and inhales Loki’s smell, earth-sweet, like he clawed himself from the ground itself that night, and the sharp metal of Thor’s blood.

Then he finally sees it, above his frantic heart; the raised ‘x’ marring his skin. A reminder Loki gave him; there are no limits.

 

-

 

In the end, whether he slept or not was a decision taken from his hands.

In the early hours of the morning they intercepted a distress signal coming from a high-end military pharmaceutical institute in Indonesia. On any official government record, this base was non-existent, thus more secured than should be considered normal.

Stark brought up the satellite images of the base, all inches-thick concrete, barbed electric fences and no windows. There were no guards. The drones Stark sent out over the perimeter with thermal cams picked up heat signals inside the building and underground, but they were all scattered and weren’t moving, yet the motion sensors were going off repeatedly.

There was also a big blasted hole in the southern side of the building, with transport crates all around.

“This is it,” said Rogers and they were on their way.

All Thor remembers are the blinking red light and the alarm shrieking in the base, the heavy smoke filling up his lungs until it felt they would burst, and Rogers shouting at him to watch out–

As he falls to the ground, he swears he hears Loki sigh a disappointed; _Oh, Thor_.

 

-

 

He thinks he has at least two, but at most three cracked ribs. He feels a gash on his right temple, close to his eye, and for a moment the image of his father’s comes unbidden and unwelcomed. There are also several bruises and cuts and burns all around his body, especially on his arms, but they are nothing he hasn’t dealt with before, so he is not that worried.

For the first time in weeks, he feels rested.

He turns onto his side on the bed, opening his eyes slow, and sees Loki, his back to the window, the city light painting his silhouette in impossible colours that shouldn’t even exist here in Thor’s room. He watches Loki watching him.

He is tall and slender, like he is just one of the many shadows that was born from the null spaces of the city lights, something in contrast, existing just to be contradictory.

Slowly, something akin to panic starts to tighten around Thor like a fist, so he squeezes his eyes shut, and wills his mind to make Loki disappear, because he doubts he has it in him to deal with this right now. If ever.

Loki’s touch is blessedly cold against his hot skin, his fingers gently following the cut on his temple.

“This won’t do, Thor. I’m getting bored.”

 

-

 

“Welcome back, Point Break.” Stark moves a small light before his pried open eyes, back-and-forth-back-and-forth, and Thor wants to punch him.

“We came back from Indonesia, patched you up and put you here, in my humble impromptu medical center,” Stark rattles while moving around him, plucking things and pressing buttons. Thor looks at Ms. Potts, who smiles kindly at him from the doorway.

“You’ve been asleep for the last 72 hours or so, I was almost worried,” Stark stops in front of him.

“He means he was worried,” Ms. Potts says.

“Ultron?” croaks Thor with a dry throat.

“He came, he saw, he got what he wanted and flew away,” says Stark. He is furiously typing something on his tablet.

Thor nods and moves to sit up and stand from the bed, the sharp lights and the smell of antiseptic with his head hurting making him irritated beyond reason. Being useless. His father’s judging eye measuring him, heavy with expectations, until he is on his feet again.

Ms. Potts comes to help him, saying something about that he shouldn’t put much pressure on his ribs, so Thor smiles and nods, barely listening. The bandages all around his torso are pulling with each movement, and Thor can’t wait to go to his rooms to tear them off.

“We are lucky you got away with only a few busted ribs and cuts, the sentries threw some really nasty transonic grenades that sent you flying faster than your hammer.” Stark flips his tablet and shows the blueprints of some device, “Good thing I was able to get to one before it went off, the tech is amazing, it was like Christmas,” he says with a smirk and moves to type something.

“He means he is glad you feel better, Thor,” says Ms. Potts patiently.

“Thank you,” Thor replies, but it doesn’t feel enough. He dips his head into Ms. Potts’ direction, and claps a hand on Stark’s shoulder. “You are great friends.”

The moment he steps into his bedroom, he rips off the bandages, and presses his hand hard on the deep blue and purple bruises, cursing, hoping that this way maybe they will bleed off of him, onto his hand, like liquid paint.

In the bathroom his headache flares up, and he unconsciously turns to the mirror, wanting to check for head wounds, but the sudden rush of blood in his ears makes him dizzy and uncentered, and he can’t decide if the faint thrumming in the air is getting louder or quietens.

Thor manages to look at himself, turning his head where is hurts the most, at his temple, but the skin is smooth and unblemished, not even a bruise. The thrumming becomes deafening again, and Thor grips the porcelain washbasin, feeling it crack under his hands, and as he hangs his head, he sees his own torso, covered in his failure wrapped in mocking-pretty colours. Before he closes his eyes the last thing that crosses his mind is that if he looks like this, what would Loki look like; he always bruised more easily than Thor.

 

-

 

“Well,” Loki’s frame comes into his view, leaning over him, his hair wavering in the light wind, blocking the sun bearing down on Thor. It feels much more cold in his shadow. “This is different.”

Thor just looks up at him, trying to remember. With his fingers he smoothes down the long grass underneath his palms, soft and yielding.

“Hello, brother,” says Loki and when his mouth pulls into a smile, Thor grabs a few grass blades between his fingertips and pulls hard.

Thor manages to sit up without touching Loki, looking around. The grass is a plump violet, all around them until his eyes can see, long and swaying in weaves. There is nothing here. Nothing.

In the sky there are three planets, one is the sun of this place, in its orbit is a smaller, deep blue, almost black planet, and a third one behind Thor and Loki, brick red and angry, but only half of it is visible over the curve of the world.

Thor calls Mjolnir, but she doesn’t come. He doesn’t feel her at all.

“My favourite is the small black, behind the sun,” points Loki, then looks back at Thor with a raised eyebrow. “Quite fitting. There is actually a fourth one on the other side, so we can’t see it, but it’s dying. It will explode soon,” Loki prattles on.

When Thor doesn’t answer, Loki clicks his tongue. “I don’t know why you are so shocked, Thor, this is all you.”

“What do you mean?” asks Thor. He is so tired.

“Ah, so he can talk,” drawls Loki smugly, looking out on the fields, leaning back on his hands, legs stretched out in the plush grass. Not a worry in the world.

“Loki.”

 “But I must say I feel hurt, that you would care more about this,” he gestures vaguely around them with a lazy hand, “than seeing your dead little brother again.”

“This is hardly the first time I dream about you,” says Thor, it’s the truth, it is but–

Loki turns to him with something like pity in his eyes. Thor feels the muscles in his jaw jump.

“Then this is a dream,” Loki says.

“Is it?”

A shrug, Loki looks like a fragile bird with his pointed shoulders, something that could snap under Thor’s finger in an instant, “Well, it is your doing, so if you say it’s a dream, it is that, no point in mindless speculating.”

Thor turns his head up for the sun to shine on him, closing his eyes, seeing sparkles of red and white. Even like this he feels Loki’s stare as it presses bruises on his skin, over where the sun kissed him, his face, his chest, his ribs with all the blues and yellows. Thor wonders if he will come out of this with more wounds than he got into with.

“Mmm. You already have so many similarities with Father, I would have hated it if even the scar matched.” Loki starts to reach for his right temple, but Thor grabs his wrist–

“Don’t touch me.”

Loki looks pointedly at his wrist. The bones creak under Thor’s grip.

“But you are allowed to, apparently.”

Thor opens his mouth to say that it wasn’t intentional, that he wasn’t thinking, but Loki tries to grab him with his other hand, Thor barely managing to catch that wrist too. He remembers how it felt when Heimdall’s fingers dug into his skin, he can’t even imagine with Loki.

“Now you fear me, brother?” Loki’s voice trembles with anger. He starts to shove and kick, trying to shake off Thor’s grip, but Thor just holds on, wrestling Loki down until he lies on his back under him, the grass fanning out around him like a mismatched halo, his hair sticking into every direction. Loki huffs, his cheeks pink and lovely with exertion. This is all it takes for Thor.

“You look stupid.” He murmurs, as lowers his eyes to follow the path of his hands travelling up, up on Loki’s arms, on his shoulder, down his collarbones, back up to his neck. Loki breathes out a laugh, his pulse jumping under Thor’s thumb, as he strokes down on it once, twice. Thor never held anything more deadly in his hands before. It was true when he said he dreams about Loki, but never this tangible.

“I look like the way you want me to. You dreamed me here, Thor.”

Thor looks into Loki’s eyes, green and impossible, and thinks that he could never create something like this.  

Loki tilts his head a little, barely, looking out into the distance for a moment, then back at Thor. Loki smiles.

“What?” asks Thor, bracing himself for whatever he sees when he looks over his shoulder, but there is nothing. Just a violet plain moving in slow weaves.

“Nothing,” Loki blinks up at him innocently. “I was just wondering.”

Thor presses his thumb into the soft meat of Loki’s jaw, just under his chin, and pushes it up so he can see Loki’s face better. Loki lets him.

“About?”

“What would happen if we burned this place to the ground.” Loki licks his lips, “But I do have a theory.”

Thor watches his mouth as he speaks, the unique way he forms his words; some of them are rounded and gentle, some of them sometimes come out clipped and short. A magician’s tongue.

“We would burn with it,” says Thor, but Loki shakes his head.

“No,” says Loki, and Thor is too slow, he forgot again how fast his brother can be, how unguarded he becomes around him. Loki reaches a hand up between them, places it on Thor’s forehead and pushes him back, until Thor starts falling to the ground. “You would wake up.”

 

-

 

Thor jolts awake in his bed, breathless, fear settling over him like dust, because when he closes his eyes again, all he can see is Loki’s mad-black hair tangled with violet, violet, violet.

 

-

 

After concluding that Ultron would not solely focus on the city, rather gather his components from all around, the team decided to scatter around the world. Preventive move. They comb through the continents, searching for any kind of activity that could indicate that Ultron has been, or will be there.

When Rogers and Stark present the plan one evening, Thor hears Mjolnir start singing with absolute elation, because they can finally leave. Thor will be far from the dark whispers of the shadows of his bedroom, the glass of his windows, which sometimes seem frozen over, blocking the lights of the city like milk, only for Thor to look at them again and be crystal clear like before. The cracked mirror in his bathroom he doesn’t have any memories of.

The bed he hasn’t touched in nine days.

Rogers in Quatar, Stark in Libya, Barton in Mexico, the twins – both immediately declaring that they would not go without the other with such vehemency and desperation to be together that makes something sad and mad and desperate curl inside Thor – in Australia, Romanov were to pick up Banner, then head to Vatican City with him. Thor in Bolivia.

That night the only thing Thor hears is that he is to leave the tower, the city, and all he thinks is _away, away, away_.  

 _Coward_. Thor turns from the voice and steps off the balcony.

 

-

 

“Come on,” says Loki, standing above him on the stairs. Three steps and Thor would be on the same level. “I’m curious.”

Thor looks up at his brother, standing tall and regal and unapproachable between the dirty walls of the staircase. His always out-of-place brother, out-of-reach, outstanding. Three steps, and–

A police siren starts up somewhere, the wailing is edgeless and far away, barely coming through, the sound coating the air like syrup.

Loki’s hair is chopped straight at his shoulders, the loose waves of his locks barely brushing them, and he is wearing dark jeans with a gray shirt that looks too big on him. Too simple, too plain. Yet.

Loki sees Thor’s wandering gaze and rolls his eyes.

“Or we could just stare at each other like dumb fawns until one of us dies of boredom. And believe me, brother, it will be me.”

Thor tries not to flush with embarrassment of all things.

“I wasn’t staring like a dumb fawn,” he replies wryly.

“You are right,” smiles Loki sweetly, “I always did call you an oaf, there is no reason to differ from perfectly established habits.”

Thor takes two steps, his head now in level with Loki’s, staring into his eyes.

“Maybe new habits are in order,” he says. They fall so easily into this, clawing at each other until there is blood.

Loki eyes widen, his smile crinkling the edges, “You rather me call you a dumb fawn?”

“I would have you call me by my name, and not by insulting ones,” says Thor.

Loki rakes his eyes over his face, then leans forward and gently touches the tip of his fingers to Thor’s jaw.

“Thor,” sighs Loki, “Thunderer. The Scion of All Asgard, Giantslayer. The Golden Son.” His next word like a curse; “Odinson.”

Thor is on the verge of recoiling, so Loki sways closer, whispering _brother_ soothingly into thick air. Wicked tongue, putting a spell on him without any magic.

_Brother. Brother. Brother._

Thor pulls out of Loki’s reach with a shuddering breath.

“Enough of this,” he demands, hating how it feels like a plea.

Loki looks at him with fat joy and holds up a single key, black plastic and silver; cheap and deadly.

“I have this key,” he says, then motions with his head up the stairs. “And there is a door.”

Thor steps around him, “Why do you have that key?”

Loki flaps the matter away, his slender hand dancing through the air as he follows him, “You gave it to me.”

“You know I didn’t,” Thor replies impatiently.

Loki gives him a flat look. “This is your dream, Thor, not mine.”

“Well, I’m not controlling it,” Thor says as they stop in front of the door. 402\. Small numbers made out of something bronze-like. The greasy-grey wallpaper frames the door ugly, starting to tear down around the edges. 

“Aren’t you?” asks Loki as he turns the key in the doorknob, wrapping his hand around it, pulling upwards a little before turning it, opening the door wide, as if he had done it a million times before.

They step into the apartment, and Thor takes the key before Loki could, shoving it deep into the pocket of his sweatpants.

“Oh would you look at that,” Loki says with laughter in his voice, looking out the window in the living room. “It’s still New York. You were finally allowed to leave, yet here you are again.”

It’s true; everything is like the real one outside, only, he doesn’t know this place. It’s normal in a way that scares him, the walls neatly painted in warm beige, the kitchen is tidy and spotless, the sofa in the living room a velvet, deep green, like the evergreens in winter. It’s night, but there is soft light coming from the small lamps around the flat, and Thor can’t help but sink deep into the cushions, propping his feet on the coffee table, stretching his arms over the back of the sofa, his shoulders popping. He could almost sleep like this, he thinks with a scoff.

“I have to say, I’m surprised that you would put us here, with how locked up you feel on Midgard,” Loki says as he opens a cupboard in the kitchen.

Thor immediately stiffens.

“I don’t feel locked up there,” he says.

Loki turns to him. “Really.”

Thor stares back at him. “Really.”

He gets a knowing smile, making Thor narrow his eyes in warning, but Loki’s attention is already on the cabinet under the sink, head halfway buried in it. You would think he never saw a kitchen.

“What are you looking for?” Thor asks after a few minutes with Loki banging around. He has moved to the living room, fleeting about Thor like a restless ghoul.

“Nothing,” he says, flipping through a book he picked up from the coffee table in front of Thor. He tosses it back uninterested; its cover is blank.

He stops near Thor’s feet, looking at him expectantly. Thor is blocking his way going about in his frenzy. Thor raises an eyebrow.

“Animal,” Loki says bored, shoving Thor’s feet off the table. This is the most fun Thor has had in a very long time.

Loki moves around the flat like a small organised disaster, picking things up and putting them back slightly askew. Only just. Like he wants to annoy someone who isn’t even living here. No one lives here. There is not even a here to talk about.

Thor watches Loki pull books off the shelf at random, barely looking inside them before putting them back, and sees how Loki’s shape redefines the space around him, forcing the nowhere to become somewhere right in front of Thor’s eyes. He demands the space he deserves.

Loki reaches up to grab a small box from the top, his shirt catching in his movement, a small glimpse of skin like a mirage, his bony elbow sticking out, his hair whispering soft against his neck, and Thor’s head fills with unshaped thoughts like _never waking up, not suffocating, with you, with you, with you._

“You are staring again,” says Loki, rummaging around in the box.

“I’m trying to figure out what is it that you are searching for,” Thor lies easily. He couldn’t care less now.

“Oh,” Loki stops for a moment, then empties the box on the dining table, small pebbles, gems and pieces of papers falling, rattling, “And here I was hoping you’d missed me. How stupidly naïve of me.”

“I did,” says Thor. “I still do.”

He does, what proves it better than that they are both here, in this small place, in a rundown apartment complex with thin walls, the outside of it surely crumbling down, bricks showing, the hallway stuffed with stale air and dust settling over the greasy wallpapers. That they are here, in this small place, a disaster tucked away in a tiny jewellery box in the middle of all this, and Thor couldn’t deny, even with how desperately he wants to, that this place screams them. A place that only becomes sacred and beautiful and doomed when Loki belongs to it. A few feet haven.     

The parameters; Twenty feet from Thor to the kitchen, fifteen to the bedroom, fifteen to the bathroom, ten from Thor to Loki.

Ten feet in such a small place, but it seems oceans wide, Thor might try to cross it, but he will drown. Only ten feet, but Thor looks at the way Loki half-heartedly tries to brush away a strand of his untamed hair as he pretends to inspect a pink gem and thinks that it’s too much a distance to be between them. Ten feet; should-be-small, should-be-smothering. Ten feet; how long can he endure?

Loki throws the gem back to the table with a sharp thud, knocking a few of them down to the plush rug that muffles their fall, and takes those few steps to Thor, stands before him like a king about to conquer a world.

“Move over,” he says.

“Why?”

“Because I said so,” scowls down at him Loki.

“Are you done picking the place apart?” Thor asks, leaning to the side a little, making a show of looking around. He can taste Loki’s irritation on the tip of his tongue, and it’s so delicious more so because he can pretend they are the way they used to be. Like this all isn’t a pipedream. A show of Thor’s weakness and misery.

Instead of answering Loki heaves an overly dramatic and long suffering sigh, dropping himself between the space of the armrest and Thor, tucking and wriggling until he can slam his legs onto Thor’s lap, making Thor grunt with the force of it, muttering about Thor being bothersome and vexing and predictable and something else Thor doesn’t understand because he says it too quiet.

Thor tries to hide his smile as he rests his hands on Loki’s legs, his jeans rough under his palms.

“Do you like it here?” Loki asks suddenly.

“What does it matter?” asks back Thor. What does all this matter? He will wake up, and Loki will still be dead.

“Don’t answer with another question,” chides Loki, trying to kick him, but Thor holds down on his leg, “You are being so difficult today.”

Thor shrugs, “You are here.”

“That doesn’t answer anything.”

Thor picks on a loose thread at the inseam of Loki’s jeans, just above his ankle, trying to think of a way to say that it _does_.

Rules to separate and compile things as easy as events and as complex as time; Loki was there, Loki was not there. An endlessly vexing guidebook for Thor’s feelings; Loki will be there, Loki won’t be there, Loki was not there, Loki was there. Loki is not here, Loki is here. A focal point, and Thor happily organized his whole being around it, not even thinking about what will happen if it disappears.

 “Look at me, Thor,” demands Loki, and Thor knows he knows Thor won’t deny him.

 He forces himself to look into Loki’s eyes. _Cruel_. “I am.”

“No. You are watching me,” says Loki, always so inconveniently smart, “but not looking.”

Thor hardens his grip around Loki’s ankle and doesn’t answer.

“Oh, brother,” Loki smiles, the word falling deceivingly soft from a too sharp mouth. “I won’t just disappear, no need to be afraid.”

“You are already gone,” Thor says, and it comes out easily, a sentence repeated until the words mash together, until they become unrecognizable and ugly and unshakable.

“Am I?” Loki asks, pulling his leg until Thor releases him, catching Thor’s arm and pulling himself from the cozy little spot he made between the cushions and the armrest. Pulls until he can fold his legs underneath him, until he can tip himself over to Thor, to lean into his space.

Pushes at Thor’s shoulders, making him go down, half laying-half sitting, his back against one of the cushion propped at the hollow edge of the armrest and the back of the couch. He has to bring his foot on the couch and plant his other on the ground to make place for Loki. He moves Thor to his liking, another thing in here Loki picks up and flicks somewhere else just because he knows he won’t be reprimanded for it.

Loki wraps the string of Thor’s hoodie around his finger, playing with it, each tug making Thor dizzy and desperate, because he can handle Loki in small amounts, when he barely touches him, but not like _this_. A spectre, that only comes alive when he can feed off the living.

“Are you starting to forget me more and more as the days go by?” Loki asks, like it would be a good thing.

Loki’s elbow presses hard into his chest, right on one of his bruises. Thor has never loved more to prove Loki wrong than in this moment.

“The opposite,” he says, placing a hand in the middle of Loki’s back, pressing him flush against Thor, making him press down on his bruise with more force. “I see you everywhere. Sometimes I see you so much around me I think I will forget how the real world looks like.”

“How very sentimental. How very you,” Loki says with a scoff.

“I will mourn you however I like,” says Thor stubborn, daring Loki to pick a fight with him on this one.

“You honestly think that this,” asks Loki, “is you mourning?”

“What else?”

Loki untangles his finger from the string, placing his palm on Thor’s chest, right above the raised ‘x’, and smiles like a dear.

“You didn’t answer me,” Loki says “am I really gone?”

Thor closes his eyes. It’s easier if he doesn’t see Loki. “You are.”

“But doesn’t this feel real?” Loki’s voice fills the space between them, his words slowly coating Thor’s skin like honey, sticky and sweet.

Before he could answer Loki presses his cheek flat to Thor’s, nuzzling against his stubble like a lazy cat, like something that is kind and mellow.

“Tell me, don’t I feel real?” Loki murmurs into his skin.

Thor slides his palm down, then over Loki’s waist, following the plains of his body, until his whole arm is wrapped around him, until his fingertips touch his belly just under his shirt, and it hurts Thor, it _hurts_. Breathing in hopeful what-ifs, resigned almosts.

Opening his eyes, over Loki’s shoulder he sees them all tangled up like a knot that could only be cut away, never unravelled.

“You do,” falls from his lips before he could think to say anything else.

“Good,” Loki says self-satisfied, and that’s when Thor feels Loki’s hand press against his side, then lower, quick-silvered fingers pulling out the key from his pocket without a hitch, the only reason Thor noticing is because when they were small Loki has practiced this on him until he could pull it off on almost anyone. Their father always caught him.

“No– ” he starts to reach for it, but it’s terribly clumsy and way too slow, Loki is already holding it out of range.

“I left you a surprise Thor,” says Loki laughing, “but you will have to find it.”

“Loki, you don’t– ” says Thor, but Loki grabs his face and plants a sloppy kiss under his eye.

“Good luck,” he says with cheer and pinches Thor hard on his thigh.

“You wretch– ” Thor yelps and falls.

 

-

 

Thor leaves Bolivia – he doesn’t tell about it to the others – and goes back to New York because he really doesn’t have a choice. It takes four days for him to find the apartment complex in the western side of Brooklyn, six more to work up the courage to walk up to it, then immediately go back to the tower. Half a day to get in and stand in front of the door, 402 glaring and mocking him all through that fifteen minutes it gets him to pick the lock. Loki could have done it in three.

He steps in, and doesn’t even bother to look around, because the only place Loki didn’t go in was the bedroom, so he heads there straight.  

It’s homey and luxurious in its own lived in way, the bed big with pillows and faux furs all thrown on it, soft rugs and softer curtains and Thor doesn’t think about any of them. The half full wine glass on the bedside table.

Loki’s scepter is under the bed, barely hidden, the sharp point of it peeking out like some expensive toy someone got bored of and didn’t know where to put.

He has to kneel down to pick it up.

As he walks out, over the rug in the living room, he hears something crunch under his boot as he steps, but doesn’t stop.

Thor slams the door shut behind him.

 

-

 

A week later, when the whole team is sitting around on the main floor, and when he says that he has Loki’s scepter, in the pressing silence that follows Rogers asks in that voice of his; “How did you get it?”

Thor shrugs and says something about blind chance and timing and Mjolnir. He refuses to meet Wanda’s eyes.

 

-

 

Loki drops the knife to the floor, its bloodied tip arching in the air, then disappearing beside Thor’s bed. He scrambles around until he finds the edge of the blanket, moving to press it against Thor chest, his palm on top, like he wants all of Thor’s blood to himself.

He says _Thor_ over and over again, fat tears slowly dripping down his face, and he leans down to whisper against his hand, trying to heal Thor so he won’t scar, but Thor knows he is not that good with his healing magic yet. He doesn’t mind it.

“Loki –” he tries to place his hand on Loki’s nape, but his brother leans out of reach. His hand is still on him.

“Why didn’t you stop me,” he asks angry, his voice breaking, “Why would you let me do this to you?”

“It’s okay,” says Thor.

Loki’s hand trembles on him as he quickly wipes across Thor’s chest, the blanket coming away bloodied, but it’s nothing, he got worse wounds while training.

“It’s not,” Loki replies, and Thor watches as a tear slides a clear path in the smudge of dirt on his cheek that he has been thinking of wiping off ever since he first saw it. “I hurt you.”

Thor leans up, quicker this time, so Loki can’t evade him, to slide his fingers into his hair, around, dragging him down to him, crushing him against his heart, the bloody mess Loki made of him. Let them be bloodied, like a strange ritual, both of them the sacrifice lambs. But to what god?

Loki heated cheek sticks to his with the salt of his tears. Thor closes his eyes and thinks that they are both being cleansed.

“I hurt you too,” Thor confesses into the dark of Loki’s hair.

Loki’s hand slips on his cut, but he steadies over it again, still trying to vanish it, trying not to give it a chance to leave even a scar behind. It will. Thor knows it will scar, wills it to.

“It’s okay,” says Thor again, but this time he whispers, so it can become a secret in the night.

Loki starts shaking all over again, Thor feels his tears dripping down on him, sliding over his neck. He hugs Loki closer, maybe this way they can hide from all the ugly things they become around each other. Keep only the beautiful, the wondrous.

Loki grips around his neck, “Thor. _Thor._ ”

Thor moves them, turns over and dips Loki to his side, but doesn’t let go, only drapes his arm over him, shielding him from his window, from the sight of the moon. And comes the ugly thing from inside his chest; keep Loki like this, always, close, close. Comes the beautiful; his little brother in his arms.

Loki stubbornly keeps his hand on Thor’s chest between them, even though Thor already can tell the cut has closed up.

Thor smoothes over Loki’s brow, but he won’t look at him.

“Stay here with me,” Thor says, and when Loki closes his eyes, he brushes his thumb against his eyelashes too, feeling them damp. “Sleep.”

Loki stays quiet and still for such a long time Thor thinks he really fell asleep. He wasn’t planning to sleep tonight, knew he couldn’t even if he wanted to. Ever since they grew out of childhood Loki doesn’t let Thor hug him that much, and spends less and less time with him. Having him this close again just makes his growing absence from Thor’s life all the more harrowing.

“I saw something Thor,” mumbles Loki, his nose pressing into Thor’s neck, “while I was travelling.”

Anxiety spikes in him again just at the mere thought of Loki travelling alone, where Heimdall couldn’t see him. He pushes it down, because he won’t make the same mistake twice in one night. He has a lifetime for that.

“It was small but so powerful,” Loki says and arches a little as Thor slides his palm down on his back, “Shiny too.”

Thor huffs, “Little magpie.”

“Thor,” Loki warns, but it’s weak and warm. “I think there are more than one. Father might have one in the vault, and I think it would be best if we collected the rest when one of us is king.”

Thor hums.

“The one I saw, someone has it, but they don’t use it to its full potential. It’s a waste.”

“Is it now?” Thor asks. How many times has Loki laid out the ground like this for something he wanted, worked up for it all proper.

“Thor, it’s beautiful, I wanted you there to see it,” Loki finally looks up at him, and when Thor sees his eyes, still red-rimmed with dark circles underneath, he knows that it’s over, “It would be perfect for my scepter.”

Thor gives a nod. “Then you will have it,” he says for equally selfish reasons.

The way Loki glides his fingers over the things Thor brings him as a gift, the way he stares into Thor’s eyes with frisky challenge and says; _You shouldn’t have brother_ , worths all the work. The way he says _perfect_ , savouring the word in his mouth like a candy Thor gave him.

Loki smiles and presses his forehead to Thor’s chest, his mouth a breath away from his cut. They leave so many scars on each other, drawing a map as they go.

Loki speaks after a while;

“Do you love me, brother?” he asks.

“I do.”

Then; “Are you proud of me?”

When Thor finally lifted Mjolnir he’d asked Loki the same.

And Thor says yes _, yes_ because he knows they both would tear whole worlds apart, bring the sky down just to be in the center of the other’s attention a little longer.

_Do you see me?_

_I can’t see anything else but you._

 

-

 

Thor has never been handed Mjolnir to him. Into his hands. As he watches Vision walk past him he almost hears Loki laugh at his dumbstruck face.

 

-

 

Loki’s fingers slide over Mjolnir’s handle, gripping it loosely, making Thor’s stomach clench. He watches with his cheek pressed to the pillow, half-buried in it, drinking in the picture of Loki standing in his room like a fine drink, nice and slow. Savouring his sharpness in his cut-out shoulders, his sweetness in the deep slope of his waist. The bite of his mouth as a distant smile pulls at it. The dizziness Thor feels after looking at him too much.

Thor loves the city now more than ever, the city that never sleeps painting his dreams while he sleeps. He loves the colors it gives Loki in his dark room, all washed-out neon blue and sluggish pink with yellows so pale they seem white.

Loki shifts a little as he holds Mjolnir firmer, and it looks like stars are glittering at the tips of his eyelashes, and Thor thinks in this moment he could love the whole world. He could. He could.

He gets out of the bed, the rug flattening under his bare feet as he makes his way to Loki and plasters himself against his back.

Loki sways forward with a hum, “I see you still can’t manage to put on a shirt before going to sleep.”

“You know I always run hot.” Thor replies, quiet so he doesn’t disturb the dark. Loki is wearing a simple white t-shirt that feels cool against his skin, and Thor welcomes it.

He digs his chin into the meat of Loki’s shoulder, gets comfortable as he runs down his hand on Loki’s outstretched arm, following his brook-like veins, squeezing lightly on his bruised wrist. His fingers fit perfectly into the shapes, a memento from those violet plains. They should have been faded by now.

“Sorry.” He mumbles, but Loki just shakes his head. True, they have done far worse to each other that they haven’t even apologized for yet.

He slides lower, putting his hand over Loki’s, easily covering it on Mjolnir’s handle.

“Careful, Thor,” says Loki with a voice that twists like snakes in a flowery pit. “We don’t know if you are worthy enough to control both me and Mjolnir.”

So this is how the night will go. Thor hardens his grip on Loki’s hand, imagining his fine diamond bones trying not to crack, while he wraps his other hand around Loki’s neck, gently easing him back until Thor can feel his spine digging into his chest, a straight line of defiance. Feeling Loki’s deep breath, irritated and nervous, is almost enough.

“I don’t want control, only mutual trust,” Thor feels Loki’s throat work, already forming his words, so he squeezes his hand lightly, in warning. His king-blue blood thrums violently against his palm. “Something only one of you gives me.”

“Oh?” Loki wriggles his hand on Mjolnir until Thor lets him go, only to reach up and pat Thor’s wrist, like he is consoling a neglected dog. “May I ask how did I hurt you this time, brother? It _is_ hard to keep track, you understand.”

“You may,” says Thor. He lifts his eyes to look out the window in front of them, but only sees the reflection of Loki’s frown, the shadow of his cupid bow as he pulls his mouth.

Thor smiles at him.

“Alright, let me go. I don’t want to talk to you with your hand around my neck.” says Loki instead.

“So we will talk?” asks Thor, but it comes out like a statement, and sees Loki’s blink at him unimpressed.

“Well, one would say that is what we are doing right now, but who–” Thor puts his hand on Loki’s mouth, muffling him, pushing back his words.

“Yes, but sadly I have a brother who could talk for hours yet not say a single thing.” Loki’s breath seeps into his palm, hot and light. “I have questions, and you will answer them.”

He looks at Loki – a building’s flickering light shining through his left eye – and waits for the nod that comes suspiciously too easy. 

He lets himself brush his thumb against Loki’s sharp jaw as he steps away. Small indulgences.

Before Thor could, Loki flings himself into his armchair, purely because he saw Thor step forward it. Thor sighs and takes the ottoman from the bed, pulls it to where Loki sits, watching as the four legs of it leave long dents in the rug and forces himself to think that it’s all worth it for the few answers he will get from Loki.

He shoves the lowtable closer to the window, making place for the ottoman right in front of Loki, and sits down. Loki’s legs jump a little when their knees touch, but doesn’t move them. Good.

“How about we make it a game, Thor? Make it more interesting.” Thor can tell that it irritates Loki that even though he technically sits a little bit higher than Thor, he still can’t look down on him, they are at eye level. Thor loves every single plus inch he has on him.

“I don’t feel like it.” lies Thor.

“Oh but I do.” Take it or leave it. Thor wants to antagonize him some more, but he feels impatient tonight, like he has a buzzing in him that only will go away if he does something soon, but he doesn’t know what. He takes it. He could count on his two hands the times he left it.

“What game?”

Loki leans his cheek on his palm, sizing up Thor like a piece of meat, smiling. “You will answer my questions too, but we each get a pass. Once we’ve both used them up, it’s over,” he thinks for a moment and adds; “No more than three questions each.”

Thor can work with that. Honestly, it’s better than he expected. He nods.

“Do you know where are the other Infinity Stones?” he asks. He got the sceptre, he wonders if Loki will give more.

“I wanted to start,” frowns Loki.

Thor rolls his eyes. “I started, so either answer or pass.”

Loki rubs across his lips with a finger, behind it his smile pulling wide. “All of them? I don’t know. I do know you best hurry, brother, because things seem to start getting a little heated. You are wasting valuable time playing hero with your friends on Midgard.”

Thor takes a deep breath, trying to lift the sudden pressure from his chest. He knows. Ever since he found the sceptre he knew he should be searching, but he has to be here too.

“Your turn,” he says instead. It feels like turning his back to a bloodhound that got his scent.

Loki leans slightly forward, his right eye black in the dark of the room, the left seems transculent in the wicked light of the moon, the deceitful colours of the streets below. Janus-faced, looking both at the past and future. This is the first time Thor really sees Loki dead.

Loki reaches out and traces Thor’s scar on his chest with the tips of his fingers. He could scratch his heart out like this, press his fingernails in a little sharper and dip into him, bleed him out.

“Does it still hurt sometimes?” he asks, his gaze following his fingers.

Thor shakes his head. “Only when you are being cruel to me.”

Loki looks up. “And now?”

“Is that your second question?”

“Yes.”

“Pass.” Thor takes Loki’s hand from his chest, his fingers bony and pale, and holds it in his own against his knee, palm up, so he can see his life line. It’s long. He should be alive still.

“To throw your pass in a question like this, honestly,” Loki says with condescension but Thor just shrugs, not looking at him.

He never thought he could have this again.

What are they doing?

“Do you miss me?” it tumbles out of him.

There are so many things he should focus on, Loki surely could help, even _would_ help, but a part of Thor that is childishly selfish, a part of him that refuses to let go needs to know this one thing–

A part of him that looks at Loki and feels hunger, all the time, always, always.

He holds Loki’s hand firmer, feels his own heat seep into it.

“Do you miss me?” he asks again looking up.

He sees Loki’s jaw shift, like he is biting on his tongue, and Thor slides his thumb over his wrist. His pulse is fluttering like a bird’s wings.

Loki’s face is impassive as he says; “Pass.”

The best answer Loki could have given.

“To throw your pass in a question like this,” smiles Thor, bringing Loki’s hand to his cheek, closing his eyes. Wishing time would stop. “Would it have been so hard to say yes?”

“I was trying to spare you the pain of a no.” murmurs Loki, but it lacks heat, the gentle brushing of his fingers over Thor’s stubble making his words tender.

What a stupid game.

“So considerate.”  He presses a quick kiss into Loki’s palm. “Come.”

Thor stands, pulling Loki as well, stepping backwards toward his bed. He wants to keep an eye on Loki, because now he feels like he is trying to catch a fleeing moment, blink and you miss it.

Loki pulls back, “You should be waking up soon, Thor, not going to sleep. I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

“I won’t sleep.” He wraps his arm around Loki’s waist, the shirt catching under his palm. Brings Loki to him, “I just want to feel you close to me.”

A smile tugs at Loki’s mouth, “You say it like this is not close enough already.”

“Closer.” He kisses the knuckles of Loki’s hand, then the bruises on his wrist. He wonders if he could ever explain this need in him to Loki. If he could make him understand. If Loki feels the same.

“Too bad we’ve both used up our passes, I would ask you a question.” Loki sighs between them.

“Ask anyway.”

Loki hums, pleased, and it makes Thor feel pleased. “How much closer?”

Loki’s words across the hollow of his neck leave him dazzled for a moment, feeling sparks dancing across his spine up and down, up and down, leaving white-hot trails on his skin, laughing at him. _How much closer?_

And Thor thought he couldn’t stand those ten feet in the apartment.

“As possible,” he breathes.

As Loki pushes him down onto the bed, Thor thinks that maybe it would be the best if he went into limbo, his own created place for lost things, like him and Loki. A twilight zone for the two of them.

Loki straddles him, his weight a sudden comfort, familiar and the most important of all, close.

“Did you know Thor,” says Loki, taking Thor’s hands and placing them on his waist, “I loved you once so much, one night in my bed I thought it really is just you and me against the world. But then we did something stupid; you and me against each other and we forgot the world.”

“Loki.”  His name comes out hoarse from Thor’s mouth, but he can barely hear it, only the cracking white-noise filling Thor’s ears, his bloodstream.

“Did you know,” continues Loki, leaning down, his smile making his eyes look like the wings of a dove, and Thor just stares, “that whenever you’d throw a fit with your storms, and I’d have the opportunity, I would stand under you rain, tipping my head up, letting the raindrops caress my face, licking them off my lips - thinking about you.”

The pain inside him makes him squeeze his eyes shut, but not quick enough to not steal a glance at Loki’s lips. _Wicked, wicked_.

“And you dare ask me if I missed you brother,” Loki’s weight shifting, his voice drifting.

“No.” Thor grabs at Loki before he could stand, turning them so he can press him into the bed under him. “No,” says Thor again, but now he looks his fill, the small scar on Loki’s forehead, the curve of his black eyebrows, his pink-rose mouth that shaped and re-shaped the word _brother_ again and again, as he saw fit, until he created Thor anew, until nothing alike could come even close to the meaning. Made Thor completely his.

He makes space between Loki’s legs, and just the way Loki opens for him has his fingers trembling for touch.

“Was it enough?” he asks. _Let me give you everything_ , he means.

Loki shrugs, “I took what I could.”                                            

A small laugh, dry from his parched mouth, leaves Thor, and when he sees on Loki’s face the first small signs of hurt and anger Thor wishes for the only thing he could never have, no matter how hard he fights and screams and curses. More time.

He dips his head, shushing Loki, his nose bumping against his, “How about this, you take what is yours, and I will take what is mine.”

“Thor–” Loki starts to say, but Thor presses against him harder, his hips slotting against Loki.

“I’m going to kiss you,” says Thor.

Loki scoffs, “You wouldn’t dare.”

“I will.” He frames Loki’s face with his hands, tipping it up slightly and smothers a smile when he hears Loki’s breath catch.

“You won’t.”

“Oh, I will,” Thor whispers against his lips, a small touch, barely there. _Chaste._

“You will wake up.” Loki’s voice wavers, but Thor just shakes his head mumbling that _he won’t, he won’t_.

Thor kisses him, and thinks that this is it. Then Loki traces clever fingers on his arms, up to the sides of his neck, on his nape, settling there, _pulling him in_ , and thinks that he has never truly lived a second before this. Then Loki sighs into his mouth, warm and sweet, and his heart falters inside his chest, burning where they are pressed together, and Thor can barely think a thought, the only word that jolts through his whole body is _Loki, Loki, Loki._

“Off–” he gasps between them, trying to take Loki’s shirt off of him, but he would have to sit up from him to do that and he simply can’t. Loki is no help either, looking up at him with blown eyes, his lips shining with their spit as he smiles. He lightly grazes his fingers down Thor’s back, making Thor stutter his hips into him, and the heat of it grips his navel so fierce he bucks and buries his face in the dark valley of Loki’s neck, growling and scowling.

“Off,” he says again. “Off, Loki, I want to see you.” He fists the end of Loki’s shirt, pushing it up, and he feels Loki tremble when the knuckles of his hand touch the skin of his stomach. He buries his face deeper, nosing along the column of Loki’s neck, until he finds the softest spot, and bites down, hard.

Loki inhales sharp, and a little sound escapes him, then he laughs.

“You will have to work for it, I’m afraid,” Loki says, winded.

Just for that Thor licks up to his sharp jaw, and bites him there too.

“Lazy,” he murmurs, and when Loki opens his mouth to answer Thor kisses him silent.

He manages to sit up, pulling Loki up with him, and his wretched little brother doesn’t even bother to hold himself up, Thor has to tug and yank at his shirt with one hand while supporting him at his back with his other, feeling the bumps of his spine. Thor wishes he could count them in the sleepy morning sun, first with his fingers, then with his mouth.

“You are just too used to people giving you what you want,” says Loki smiling, when he is freed from his shirt, his hair sticking into every direction, and Thor is suddenly hit with a wave of fondness, a quiet warm feeling, so he leans in to kiss Loki again and again, letting him take the shirt from his hand to throw it somewhere, Thor doesn’t even hear it land through the buzzing in his ears. Of course Loki would help with this.

Thor pushes Loki back, smiles at the overly willing way his brother lays down, and now Thor can finally look at him. He could watch the curves and straight lines of Loki’s torso play before his eyes forever.

Thor grabs Loki’s narrow waist to still him, his hand a blunt contrast to his pale skin, and pulls Loki flush to him, Thor’s hardening cock pressing up against him, making both of them gasp.

Thor thrums with satisfaction, licks his lips and leans down to press a wet kiss square on Loki’s chest.

“Lucky you are here to keep me in check,” he chuckles the words into Loki’s skin, feeling absurdly, ridiculously, unbelievably happy.

_This is it, this is it._

Loki hums, raking his fingers through Thor’s hair, “An endlessly tiring task.”

“Poor you,” mumbles Thor, licking around a small nipple, pink and hard.

Loki’s breath escapes him in a rush, tightening his legs around Thor, “Poor me.”

Thor pets Loki on his side, his waist, slipping his hand under, flattening his palm on the small of his back, _burning hot_ , and lifts him up into an arch, grinding them together, Loki’s cock hard against his stomach. Loki lets out a whine that makes Thor’s skin tingle something wonderful.

“How far?” Thor asks, voice coming low.

“I don’t–” Loki starts, but stops and takes a deep breath, his fingers digging into Thor’s shoulders, and he hopes Loki will leave marks on him. “You will definitely wake up, Thor.”

Thor feels fear build up in him, but leans down to kiss Loki on his brow, on his cheek, his lovely chin. “At least we both get something nice out of this before that.”

Loki doesn’t let him up, winds his arms around his neck, pressing his forehead against Thor’s and asks in a hushed voice, “Do we?”

Thor knows what he means. They are trading moments of pleasure for an eternity of agony, and the price will never be paid in full. They will get this, but then? What then? It will only hurt more.

“I know,” says Thor, rubbing their foreheads together, hugging Loki closer to him. If only he wouldn’t be this selfish, this stupidly hopeful. “I know, please.”

Like this way they could stay together.

Loki kisses him deep, and Thor tastes his want. His sadness too.

“And you say I’m the cruel,” huffs Loki, his breath hot on Thor’s face. He kisses the smile off from Thor’s face.

Loki sneaks his hands between them, sliding his palms down on Thor’s chest, his stomach, until he reaches the waistline of his sleeping pants, dipping in only so just the tips of his fingers brush against the hair growing there, and Thor holds back his breath in anticipation, but then Loki pulls out, resting his palms on his waist.

Before Thor could mutter how _unfair_ he is being, Loki kisses him again, slides down his sleeping pants under his ass in one move, and grabs Thor cock, giving it two hard strokes, but it’s too dry.

Thor jumps and he grits his teeth, curling a hand in Loki’s hair. “Loki–”

“What?” Loki asks, his innocent voice drips with false sweetness and how Thor loves and hates him.

Thor takes Loki’s face in his hand, opening his jaw, holding his palm up for Loki, “Lick.”

For once Loki does what he is told, licks up Thor’s palm like it’s a treat, hums when he reaches the pads of his fingers, his eyes twinkling up at Thor.

“You are impossible,” murmurs Thor, but he is already freeing Loki from his pants, his cock hard and the tip already slick with precum, and gives Loki a few strokes, sliding easy with his spit.

Loki jerks into his touch, and Thor slaps his hand away from his own, lowering himself, taking them both in his hand, and _oh._

Loki thrusts against him, his breathing coming more ragged by the minute, “Finally,” he starts to say, but moans as Thor grinds down on him, pressing his weight down, “Finally, something even you can do right.”

“Give me your hand,” says Thor, but he barely hears himself, takes Loki’s hand to lick his palm a few times, hurried and sloppy, then guides it to their cocks to hold them. He makes the mistake of looking at them sliding together, their precum mixing, and his hips stutter.

He grabs Loki’s waist with both hands, his fingers slipping on his skin and thrusts, uncoordinated, watching Loki’s brows as he furrows them, his mouth opening to suck in more air.

Thor falls down on him, licking into Loki’s hot mouth, slipping his hand around Loki, down his pants to cup and squeeze the tight swell of his ass, “Next time I will come inside you.”

Loki curves into him with a hiss, clinging to him, “Yes, yes, I want–”

Thor pushes his sweaty face into Loki’s neck, his hips moving against him, licks up the side of his neck, groans at the taste, “Stay. Loki. Stay here with me.”

Thor blindly reaches down between them, fast, clenching his fist around them both, around Loki’s fingers, working them harder.

“I love you so much,” he gasps into Loki’s mouth, kissing back his moan, and that’s when he feels Loki’s whole body become taut, his come splattering on their stomachs, and he follows, his being lighting up with it. A star could born from the two of them.

Still panting, he takes Loki’s face into his shaky, sticky hands, looking into the deep blackness of Loki’s eyes and there is something hidden in them, something open and vulnerable, and Thor thinks that the only place for him on this wretched world is between Loki’s legs.

He kisses Loki thoroughly, desperately trying to do something, because their time is up.

“Tell me how to live my life without you in it,” Thor whispers, broken, wanting to take more from Loki.

Loki’s small laugh caresses his lips; “The way I lived my life with you in it Thor; never-ending longing.”

In the end Loki sighing a quiet, hopeless _I love you too_ is his undoing.

 

-

 

Ultron is gone, but as Thor watches Wanda comb through her twin’s hair with her fingers, trying to get rid of the dust, he thinks that they have lost too much. They have to be better. He has to be better.

He can still feel Loki’s skin under his fingertips, wishes he could remember his taste too, but the blood in his mouth–

 

-

 

Thor sleeps, but Loki never visits.

 

-

 

_“I’m here.”_

**Author's Note:**

> please i'm sorry it's unbetad 
> 
> the explicit tag is for some hanky panky bc i was too embarrassed to write more  
> if you need me to tag something pls tell me!
> 
> kudos are really appreciated and don't hesitate to tell me your thoughts i'm thirsting for feedback i want to improve! thank you so much for reading🧡


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